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AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION. 



FEME'S ORIGINAL 



WHOLE-LENGTH PORTRAIT OF WASHINGTON. 



A PLEA FOR EXACTNESS IN HISTORICAL WRITINGS. 



BY 



CHARLES HENRY HART, 

OF PHILADELPHIA, PA. 



(From tbe Annual Report of the American Historical Association for 1890, 
Vol. I, pages 189-200.) 




WASHINGTOJST: 

GOTEBNMENT PEINTINa OFFICE." 
1897. 



VIII.-PEALE'S ORIGINAL WHOLE-LENGTH TORTRAIT OF 
WASHINGTON. 

A Plea for Exactness in Historical "Writings. 



By CHARLES HENRY HART, 
OF PHILADELPHIA, PA. 



189 



C0^-N( 



^3\l 
.4-5 
.H35 



PEALE'S ORIGINAL WHOLE-LENGTH PORTRAIT OF WASHING- 
TON-A PLEA FOR EXACTNESS IN HISTORICAL WRITINGS. 



By Charles Henry Hart. 



These Uuited States of America liave grown old enough to 
possess a distinct historical art. That this is a fact is being 
broadly recognized. It is shown in a marked degree by the own- 
ers of old family portraits. A few years ago their venerated 
ancestors could look down upon them only through the medium 
of a Eeynolds, a Kneller, or a Lely without the least regard to 
chronology or life-long distance between putative painter and 
sitter. To-day, with perhaps little better respect for time and 
place, these same ancestors are from the easels of Smibert or 
Copley, West or Peale, Stuart or Trumbull, while all the former 
Cosway miniatures are now by Malboue. We may smile at 
the change, but it leans in the right direction.^ That we may 
maintain our prerogative to this dignified j^osition and see its 
importance increase, the questions that will necessarily arise 
must submit to the same scrutiny, bear the same investigation, 
and be tested by the same immutable rules of evidence as 
every other department of historical study. 

Too much hitherto in this domain has depended upon tradi- 
tion, that baseless fabric of a dream, which to follow is as the 
ignis fatuus, leading nowhere and to nothing. Accepted tradi- 
tion and the blind following of one another, without submitting 
the statements followed to careful consideration, have caused 
many respectable writers to lend themselves to the dissemina- 
tion and perpetuation of error. This very condition in the 
department of study to which I have paid especial attention, 
suggested the present paper, wherein I shall correct some often 
repeated errors, caused either by writers blindly following one 
another, or by their not giving due weight to the exact meaning 
of words, they have been led into a confusion-of ideas, resulting 
in positive statements directly at variance with the facts. 

If history is to be written with perspicuity and accuracy there 
are two canons that must be observed. One is, take nothing 

' Vi(ie, tlje writer's "Limner of Colonial Days," Harper's Weekly, July 4, 1896. 

191 



192 AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION. 

for granted. Go to the foimtaiu bead. The most careful will 
sometimes slip, e'en though the cause be the ijrinter's devil. 
The other is, use exact language. Carefully weigh the mean- 
ing of words to express the precise sense you wish to convey. 
Our tongue is sufficiently pliable that words can readily be 
found to express almost every shade of meaning; and when 
readers come to know that words are not used haphazard, but 
are given their due value, they will learn to read with like 
precision and understand accurately the writer's sense. 

These reflections have arisen from my ijiability to account 
for the eminent historians to whom 1 have alluded falling into 
the grievous error of translating "defaced" into "destroyed," 
otherwise than by a disregard of Just such rules. Exactness 
in understanding, as well as in expression, would have avoided 
the writing out of existence of an important historical picture 
which I shall have the pleasure of showing is in existence 
to-day. 

When a man reads that a thing has been "totally defaced," 
let him not pass it on as "totally destroyed." Let him recognize 
that a thing "defaced" may be restored, or if beyond restora- 
tion, that it may exist for ages in its defaced condition. The 
Venus of Milo is defaced by the loss of her arms, but the most 
daring iconoclast would not have the temerity to assert that 
she was therefore destroyed. And praise be to God, she will 
last for centuries, thus defaced, i^ot very long ago, in this 
good State of New York, a monument erected to the romantic 
Andre was defaced, but no one has claimed that it was 
destroyed. So in the case under consideration, the picture that 
was del^iced one hundred and fifteen years ago, instead of being 
destroyed, as numerous authorities positively state it to have 
been,^ was restored and to-day exists without an apparent 
blemish to the superficial observer. 

" "This picture was afterwards (1781) defaced and totally destroyed."— W. S. Baker's 
Engraved Portraits i)f Washington, 1880, p. 14. 

" The Portrait ordered for tlio State was totally destroyed in 1781, by some vandals who 
broke into the couniil chamber and ruthlessly dcfaeed it beyond the hope of restoration. "— 
Elizabeth Bryant Johnston's Original Portraits of Washington, 1882, p. 11. 

"In 1781, some persons unknown broke into the council chamber and defaced and totally 
destroyed tlie picture."— Scharf and AVestcotfs History of Phihidclphia, 1884, p. 1036. 

"Which was wantonly destroyed. "—Justin Winsor's Critical History of America, 1888, 
VoL VII, p.r)65. 

"The portrait was painted, it was placed in the council chamber and it was destroyed."— 
W. S. Baker's History of a rare Washington Print, Pa. Mag. Hist. Biog., 1889, Vol. 
XI 11, p. 261. 

"This portrait destroyed in September, 1781."— W. S. Baker's Itinerary of General 
Washington, 1892, p. 150. 

" It is no longer in existence'— Paul Liecester Ford's Peaje's Full length of Washing- 
ton, Harper'8 Weekly, May 16, 1^96. 



PEALE's portrait of WASHINGTON. 193 

To Charles Willsou Peale, the Doyen of American painters, 
was accorded the distinguished honor of painting Washington 
from hfe more often than any of his contemporaries. He 
began in May, 1772, with the Virginia colonel, and ended in 
Sei^tember, 1795, with the first President of the United States. 
In the interim he had a dozen other sittings, and in the current 
number of one of our most popular magazines^ I had the 
privilege of introducing to the public a newly found portrait 
of Washington, by Peale, in which the commander in chief is 
delineated wearing his military cocked hat, the only Revolu- 
tionary portrait of him in which he is so represented. This 
l^ortrait is of great historic as well as artistic value, for it was 
paintpd to relieve the tedium of winter quarters at Valley 
Forge, upon a piece of bed ticking, the only available material 
to be had in those days that tried men's souls. 

A close comparative study of this newly found Valley Forge 
head with Peale's well-known whole-length portrait, having 
iSTassau Hall in the distance, satisfies me that this Valley Forge 
]^icture was his guide for the head in the whole-length painting. 
The investigation thus instituted was uncommonly rich in re- 
sults. It developed this vsingle atom of foundation for the often 
repeated, but apocryphal, story, that the original of these whole 
length portraits had been painted under a resolve of Congress, 
was begun at Valley Forge, continued at Monmouth, and fin- 
ished in Philadelphia, but never delivered by the artist, owing 
to the failure of Congress to appropriate its stipulated price 
of $8,090. I say " apocryphal," because Peale's price for a 
copy of his whole-length portrait of Washington was 30 
guineas,^ and Congress never resolved that he should paint one 
at any price. Owing to these somewhat important facts, the 
superstructure is without a foundation and with the inevitable 
collapse. 

Having thus cleared away the mirage of tradition, I will 
lelate briefly the true history of the picture. 

In the midst of the campaign Congiess summoned Wash- 
ington to Philadelphia for consultation. He arrived on the 
22d of December, 1778, and remained until the 2d of the 
ensuing February. On January 18, 1779, nearly a year after 

' McClure's Magazine for December, 1896. 

2 Letter from Peale to Governor Harrison, of Virginia, October 30, 1784, Dreer Collection, 
Historical Society of Pennsylvania. 

H. Doc. 353- — 13 



194 AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION. 

Valley Forge aud six moiitlis after Monmfnitli, tlie supreme 
executive council of Pennsylvania, wbicli was the State 
government, enacted ' that — 

Whereas the wisest, freest, and bravest nations, in the most virtnons 
times, have endeavored to perpetuate the memory of tliose who have ren- 
dered their country distinguished service, by preserving their rest-mblance 
in statutes an<l paintings; this council, deeply seusible how much the 
liberty, safety, and happiness of America in general, and Pennsylvania in 
particular, is owing to his excellency General Washington aud the brave 
men under his command, do — 

Ilcsolvv, That his excellency General Washington be reciuested to per- 
mit this council to place his portrait in the council chamlter, not only as 
a mark of great respect which they bear to his excellency, but that the 
contemplation of it may excite others to tread in the same glorious and 
disinterested steps, which lead to public happiness and private honour. 
And that the iiresident be desired to wait on his excellency the General 
Avith the above request, aud, if granted, to inquire Avhen and where it 
will be most agreeable to him for Mr. Peale to attend him. 

Washington assented to the request, communicated by 
President Eeed, in a letter dated "Headquarters, Philadel- 
phia, January 20, 1778,"^ and sat to Peale within the fortnight 
he remained in tlie city. The opportunity thus afforded 
Peale was without doubt, from the limited time at Washing- 
ton's disposal, devoted chiefly to the delineation of the figure, 
— no inconsiderable work in a life-size, if not heroic, whole- 
length portrait, on a canvas 51) inches by 1)3 — and the face 
was painted, as I have said, from the Valley Forge head, 
which would also go far to explain the reason for the uncov- 
ered head in this whole-length i^ortrait appearing dispropor- 
tionately small; although Washington did have a small head. 
The result, according to the newsj)apers of the day, was "a 
striking likeness,'' 

When the liinshed picture was delivered it was hung in the 
council chamber in the building now known as Independence 
Hall, but correctly the Old State House, where on Sunday 
night, the 9th of September, 1781, to follow the Freeman's 
Journal of three days later, "a fit time for the Sons of Lucifer 
to perpetrate the deeds of darkness, one or more volunteeis 
in the service of Hell broke into the State House in this city 
and totally defaced the picture of his excellency General 
Washington and a curious engraving of the monument of the 
patriotic (leneral Montgomery, done in France in the most 
elegant manner." 

' Colonial Records of Peniis.vlvaiii.i, Vol. XI, p. 671. 
'^'Peiinsjlvania Archives, Vol. VII, p. 161. 



PEALE's portrait of WASHINGTON. 195 

The reporter of this occurrence j)ossessed the merit, not 
coinmou in gentlemen of his craft, of using exact hmguage, 
and when he said that "the picture of his excellency (Jeneral 
Washington" was "totally defaced," he did not mean that it 
was "totally destroyed." And it was not. 

Charles Willson Peale's position as a portrait painter is very 
much underestimated. The reason for this may be found in 
the multitude of inferior heads he put into frames for his 
museum gallery, and by which he is chiefly known. But any- 
one who saw the tine examples from his easel, in the exhibition 
of historical portraits, the first held in this country, that I had 
the honor to direct at the Academy of Fine Arts, Philadelphia, 
nearly a decade ago,' will be very sure to have a marked 
respect for the ability of the man who limned them and to 
recognize that his work has a distinctly high iilace in the art 
of the period. His portraits are real, if they are somewhat 
hard, and his likenesses are always true. Apart from his 
ability as a portrait painter, he was a skilled mechanician, and 
had served his apprenticeship to a saddler; indeed, he paid for 
his first lessons in art Avith a saddle. Therefore, when he saw 
his original whole-length portrait of Washington "defaced," 
he knew that it was not "destroyed," but, by deft handling, 
the injured canvas could be backed with a sound one and the 
defacements restored, so as to be barely visible. Accordingly 
the picture was reliued and restored, and retained its place in 
the council chamber. 

The Supreme Executive Council of Pennsylvania ceased to 
exist on the third Tuesday of December, 1790, and the State 
Government under the new constitution took its place. The 
capital remained in Philadelphia until 1799, when it was re- 
moved to Lancaster, and thence to Harrisburg in 1812. Por 
some now unknown reason, probably want of space, the whole- 
length portrait of Washington, with Martin's familiar "thumb 
portrait" of Dr. Franklin, willed by the great philosopher to 
the Supreme Executive Couu(;il, of which he had been presi- 
dent, and one of President Thomas Wharton, painted and pre- 
sented bj^ Peale, were left behind, so that when, in 1802, Peale 
removed his celebrated nuiseum from the hall of the American 
Philosophical Society to the State House, he found these i)or- 
traits hanging ui)on the walls. In his "Historical Catalogue 



' Vitle Catalogiio of Exliibition of Historical Portraits, Deceuiber 1, 1887, lo January 15, 
388. 12mo. pp. 148. 



196 AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION. 

of the Paiutiugs iu the Philadelphia Museum," printed iu 181. "3, 
Peale openly avows the ownership of these pictures in the 
State, thereby showing' conclusively that the original whole- 
length portrait of Washington, he had painted to its order in 
1779, had not been destroyed aud was then iu existence. The 
entries are as follows: 

212. Whole length of General G. Washington. 

213. Thomas Wharton, esq. See No. 11. 

214. Dr. Benjamin Franklin. See No. 1. This and ihc two preceeding 
helonfj to the State. 

To coiToborate and emphasize this printed record, the writer 
has two unpublished original letters directly on the subject, 
which strangely came together in his possession, of course 
from divergent sources. 

Harrisburg, Jjn-il 13, 1S14. 
To CuAiiLKS W. Pkale, Esq., VhUadelphia. 

Sir: The (Jovernor having been informed that the portrait of the late 
President Washington and of the late Governors Franklin and Wharton, 
the property of the Commonwealth, which were formerly placed in the 
chamber of the Siipieme Executive Council in Philadelphia, are now iu 
your possession, aud that you are ready to deliver them up to the proper 
authority, now directs me to request that you will be pleased to cause them 
to be safely Ijoxed up and forwarded to this place by some safe opportunity, 
the reasonable expense of which will be paid at this office to your order. 
I am, respectfully, your friend, 

James Trimble, 

Deputy Secretary. 
(Endorsed:) "Answered." 

Philadelphia, May 5, 1814. 

To James Tki.mble, Esq., Deputy Secretary, IIarrisJ)uri/. 

Sir: Your letter of the 13th of last month to my father was duly 
received, and I shall immediately prepare the pictures which belong to the 
Commonwealth, which I have under my care, and shall be forwarded by 
the most proper conveyance with safety. 

My father having retired froui the immediate labours of the museum, 1 
am appointed his successor, which station I hope to fultill with satisfac- 
tion toniy fellow-citizens. 

With great respect, I am your most obedieut servant, 

Rubens Peale, 

(Endorsed:) "Reubens Peale relative to certain paintings." 

Notwithstanding the nota bene in the catalogue and the 
foregoing correspondeuce, the portraits of Washington, Frank- 
lin, and Wharton seem to have renniined a i)art of the museum 
collection, signifying that Peale must in some manner have 
acquired owiiershij) in them. In 182L the museum became a 
stock corporation, from which time its life began to ebb, until 
in October, 1854, the pictures that had belonged to its collection, 



PEALe's portrait of WASHINGTON. 197 

incliiding the portraits of Washington, Fraukliii, and Wharton, 
were put up at public sale in Philadelphia, and Peale's whole- 
length AVashington and Martin's rrauklin were bought on the 
first choice at $;)60 each by Mr. Henry Pratt McKean, coinci- 
dently a great-grandson of Thomas McKean, who was governor 
of Pennyslvania when the capital was removed from Phila- 
delphia, and these portraits left behind. 

That the whole-length portrait of Washington, bought at 
the museum sale by Mr. McKean, and now in possession of 
his son, Mr. Thomas McKean, at Fernhill, German town, Pa., 
is the identical original i)icture painted for the Supreme Execu- 
tive Council of Pennsylvania, in 1779, and " defaced," but not 
"destroyed," by the marauding vandals, the writer recently 
had the op])ortunity of establishing by a direct examination of 
the canvas, while in the process of again being restored, when 
the cuts and slashes that had "totally defaced" it, could easily 
be seen. In one place, to the extreme left in the middle dis- 
tance, where in some of the repetitions of this picture two 
horsemen are represented, a square patch of wholly new 
canvas has been inserted. 

As a sequel to this curious history, it may be well to note 
that Peale painted many repetitions of this whole-length i)or- 
trait of 1770. One signed and dated the same year was 
brought to this country from France more than half a century 
ago by Julius, Count de Menou, and its history and vicissi- 
tudes are scarcely less remarkable than of the one under spe- 
cial consideration. Its pedigree is vague and uncertain. It 
was sold by Count de Menou in October, 1841, to Charles B. 
Calvert, of Prince George County, Md., who lodged it with 
the National Institute for the Promotion of Science, then 
recently incorporated as the forerunner of the Smithsonian 
Institution. With its collections the portrait adorned the 
Patent OfiSce until 1861, when the National Institute became, 
extinct, by the limitation of its twenty-year charter, and its 
gatherings were turned over, as it was legally provided they 
should be, to the Smithsonian Institution. Tliere the portrait 
of Washington remained until by special act of Congress it 
was sent to Philadelphia for the Centennial Exposition of 
187G, and for some time afterwards it hung in the Penn- 
sylvania Academy of Fine Arts. In 1880 it was reclaimed 
by the Smithsonian Institution, taken to Washington and 
placed in the Corcoran Art Gallery, where it was kept until 



l98 AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION. 

1882, wlien the Library Committee of Congress ])aid $5,000 for 
it to Titiau li. Peale, the yoiiugest and last surviving child of 
Charles Willson Peale/ and the picture now decorates the 
gallery leading to the Senate chamber in the Capitol. 

Another repetition of this wliole-leugth portrait of Washing- 
ton was taken to the French King, Louis XVI, by Gerard De 
Rayneval, the ambassador from France, when he returned 
home in October, 1779, and is with little doubt the picture now 
in the Versailles Gallery. The frigate L' Aurora, that carried 
Gerard, took also John Jay and William Carmichael on their 
mission to Spain, and Mr. Carmichael had in his charge one of 
these pictures which he was to sell for Peale, or on failure of 
sale to present to the King of Spain. Carmichael sold the pic- 
ture, but Peale had to wait eight years before he could obtain 
payment from Brockholst Livingston, to whom Carmichael 
intrusted the money for transmission to Peale, and then only 
secured it through the agency of Bishop White. Another was 
painted the same year for Henry Laurens, and was with him 
when he was captured by the British Captain Keppel, who 
appropriated the picture, and it has descended to the present 
Earl of Albermarle, who has it at Quiddenham Park, Norfolk, 
England. From it a copy was made a fey^ years ago for the 
Massachusetts Historical Society. 

There is one at Shirley, on the James Eiver, the seat of the 
Carter family, some of wbom intermarried with the Washing- 
tons, which is dated 1780, but its early history is unknown. 
Another, dated 1781, was recently brought to this country 
from Cadiz and exhibited at the American Art Association, 
New York. On December 24, 1782, Peale wrote to Eichard 
Lloyd, at Annapolis, "I have sent your whole-length portrait 
of General Washington by stage," and on January 30, 1783, 
he advised Governor IMathews, of South Carolina, "I have a 
whole length of his excellency General Washington in hand, 
which will be done by the time you will receive this." Yet 
another was sent to tlie Island of Cuba.^ But the identity or 
whereabouts of the three last named cannot be determined. 
Within a few weeks I have been shown a photograph from 
England of yet another.^ 

Peale reduced tlie whole-length figure to three-quarter length 
and made several copies of that size, as well as a mezzotinto, 

•Titian R. Teale died in Diiladelpliia ISfjircli 13, 1885, aet. 85. 
2 Letter tVoin (;. W. Peale to Charles Carroll. August, 1779. 

^Tliis picture ba.s since been brought to this eountry and presented to the Metropolitan 
Muaouui of Art, New York. 



PEALE's portrait of WASHINGTON. 199 

Which he published in August, ITSO.' One of these reductions 
is in the family of Elias Boudinot, and another, i^ainted for 
Count Rochambeau, for which he paid the artist 16 guineas,^ 
and therefore was not presented by Washington, as family tra- 
dition says, hangs in the Chateau de Rochambeau in France/ 
There is an obviously intentional omission in the detail of 
uniform in some of the pictures that were destined to be sent 
abroad, the reason for which it would be interesting to know. 
In the original portrait belonging to Mr. McKean, and in some 
of the replicas, Washington is represented wearing the broad 
blue Tibband, which he prescribed for himself, in General 
Orders, "Cambridge July lith, 1775" to designate the Com- 
mander in Chief,^ but which some writers have jjersisted in 

1 These prints are excessively rare, only three or four impressions being tnown to exist. 
One may be found among the iconographic rarities presented by tbe late William H. 
Huntington, of Paris, to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Kew York. 

2 Philadelphia July 25, 1782 
Dear Sir: Be pleased to inform me if his Excellency the Count Rochambeau left Six- 
teen Guineas for me which I had informed him was my charge for the coppy of Gen. 
Washington's picture. 

I am with musch esteem your most humbl. srvt. 

Chas. Peale. 
To Mr Marbois. 

^The Chateau de Rochambeau. By J. G. Rosengarten. Proceedings American Philo- 
sophical Society. Vol. 33, page 353. 

■•Head Quarters, Cambridge, July 14th 1775 

P&role-IIalifax Counter Sign, Inverness 

The General observing great remissnes.s and neglect in the several guards in and about 
the camp, orders the Officers commanding any Guard to turn out his Guard, immediately 
upon the near approach of The Commander in Cliief or any of the General Officers and 
upon passing the Guard; The Commander in Chief is to be received with rested arms ; 
the Officer to salute and the Drums to beat a march. The Majors General with rested 
Anns, the Officer to salute and the Drums to beat two Ruffles. The Brigadiers General 
with rested Arms, the Officers to salute and the Drums to beat one Ruffie. There being 
something awkward, as well as improper, in the General Officers being stopp'd at the out- 
posts; ask'd for passes by the Sentries, and obliged often to send for the Officer of the 
Guard, who it sometimes happens is as much unacquainted with the Persons of the Gen- 
erals, as the private men, before they can pass in or out : It is recommended to both Officers 
and Men, to make themselves acquainted with the persons of all the Officers in General 
Comniand. and in tbe mean time to prevent mistakes: The General Officers and their 
Aids-de-Camp, will be distinguished in the following manner. 

The Commander in Chief by a light blue Ribband, wore across his breast between his 
coat and Waistcoat. 

The Majors and Brigadiers General by a Pink Ribband wore in like manner. 

The Aids-de-Camp by a green ribband. 

Head Qitakters, Camhridije, July 24th, 1775 
Counter Sign, Cmnberland 
Tarole- Salisbury 

It being thought proper to distinguish the Majors from the Brigadiers General by some 
particular Mark; for the future the Majors General will wear a broad purple ribband. 

Notwithstanding the General Orders marking the distinctions of General Officers, 
Aids-de-Camp, &.c., the Generals are fre(iuently stopp"d by the centinels, which can only 
hajjpen from the Captains h.aving neglected to read the Orders to their respective Com- 
panies ; If any General Officer. Aid-de-Caiiip, or Mii jor of Brigade, is again stopped through 
the ignorance of the Centinels ; the Captains will be responsible." 



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